Captain Jason Charless sat idly on the grille that looked down across a vast room full of cigar-shaped metal things with stubby wings. Behind him was a control panel and next to it a complex computing machine. From this room, buried deep in a man-made cavern in the mountains, Charless--or any of his command--could calculate and then direct any one of the horde of guided missiles to any place on earth. A millionth of a second after it had arrived at its destination, that place would cease to exist save as a cloud of incandescent gas, a wave of radiant energy, and a mounting white pillar of radioactive particles. It was a dull job; a nasty job; a job no man would accept willingly. A policeman, Jason thought bitterly, directs his energies in many ways besides shooting criminals. But Charless could only sit and wait--hoping he would never be called to compute and then direct even the smallest of these devil's eggs against an active enemy. On the floor of that cave was a planet-staggering quantity of atomic explosive. That it might go off did not occur to Charless. It could not; it was impossible because he, Captain Jason Charless, held complete and absolute control over every bit of its complex machinery at the dials and buttons of the control panels. He was the master-- Jason Charless blinked foolishly. At the far end of the vast cave, the sealed door opened swiftly. "Who--?" he called angrily, then turned to look at his control panel; it was inert. Then at the far end of the floor, Guided Missile Number One lifted on its launching rack and roared into life. It zoomed through the open door with the thunder of hell and was gone into the sky. Charless swore viciously. He grabbed the telephone to give someone particular and official hell for not telling him--_but he controlled them_. Not an indicator was showing on his panel. Did he really control them? Missile Number Two raised and zoomed out, its rocket exhaust thundering in the vast cave. He saw Number Three follow Number Two, then Number Four followed Number Three. Number Five left with split-second timing, and Number Six followed. Number Seven left as Charless sounded the general alert, and Number Eight zoomed into the sky before the sirens began to sound. Number Thirty-seven had passed the open door by the time Charless managed to get his call through to his commanding officer. Number Eighty-one went out on its trail of flame by the time that General Lloyd's official command came into the cave on feet driven by fear. Number Two Hundred arrowed into the upper air while Lloyd's men were searching the known spectra of electromagnetic radiations in an effort to discover who or what was capable of directing radio-controlled missiles that should have been inert until Jason Charless awakened them by pressing the proper button.